Pierre Poilievre squared off with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for the first time as Leader of the Loyal Opposition Thursday and not since Stephen Harper entered the House of Commons as the first leader of the Conservative Party of Canada, had Question Period seen such a stark contrast in political styles and ideological objectives .Under Poilievre's aggressive questioning, Trudeau was reduced to tongue-tied responses as he repeatedly stuttered through his talking points. In fact, Trudeau looked like he had the stuffing knocked out of him..Poilievre was most effective in nailing down Trudeau on tax increases — with more pension money being deducted from workers’ paychecks and more carbon taxes anticipated..The new Conservative leader also went after one of Trudeau’s most vulnerable points: his chronic and agonizing hypocrisy. From doing blackface to not wearing a mask when he thought no one was looking, Trudeau’s rules always apply to everybody but him..Poilievre reminded Trudeau Canadians don’t have an option of heating their homes in the winter: ”Heating your home in January and February in Canada is not a luxury.”.And he finally said what many people have been waiting a long time to hear from a Conservative leader: Greenhouse gasses are not pollution. .“This does not make Canadians polluters. They are just trying to survive. This from a PM who burned more jet fuel in one month than 20 average Canadians burn in an entire year.”.As a parting shot, Poilievre challenged the prime minister..“So will the PM ground the jet, park the hypocrisy, and axe the tax hikes?”.It's not been a good two weeks for Trudeau as he has become the Twitter target of the #TrudeauHasGotToGo hashtag, with hundreds of thousands of people sharing their stories of how COVID-19 vaccine mandates adversely and catastrophically affected their lives. It all began when one of Trudeau’s French-language interviews was replayed, in which he smeared anti-vaccine protesters as “misogynistic and racist.".During his stay in London to attend the state funeral of Queen Elizabeth II, he was surreptitiously recorded singing “Bohemian Rhapsody” with piano accompaniment. The video went viral on social media and Trudeau was widely criticized for again grandstanding and looking ridiculous on the world stage..But the difference between Poilievre and Trudeau is not just cosmetic. Poilievre is by far the better speaker and he has honed those skills during a long and arduous leadership campaign that saw him draw huge crowds across Canada. He positively makes Trudeau look old, tired and off balance..But it’s the vision for the country that really separates the two men. Poilievre has been classified as a populist — in so far as he's appealing to average people, that's a fair categorization. But he's also offering the sort of common sense, positive conservatism that President Ronald Reagan preached so successfully. He wants Canadians to keep more of the money they earn to constrain the power and control of government. Trudeau cannot imagine Canada moving forward without the strong arm of the state leading it. He's all about government programs fulfilling the needs of Canadians. .So there’s a conservative leading the CPC again. He’s talking the talk. He needs to continue to walk the walk and start talking about privatizing the CBC again.
